Among all the research I did and all the books I read while writing American Terrorist, one of the more fascinating topics was the National Counterterrorism Center. This is a central building in Mclean, Virginia where all the government agencies, FBI, CIA, NSA, etc. work together and share intel.
My primary source of research for the NCTC was a book by Ronald Kessler called The Terrorist Watch. I had also read the book, The Bureau, specifically about the FBI, but The Terrorist Watch pertained to the agency’s war on terror and therefore a bit more relevant to my story.
It’s a fairly well-written book that I would recommend to anyone. It does have a right-wing slant it which I don’t mind so much in the context of the effort by the men in women in serving in the military or intelligence agencies. It does unfortunately feel the need to wedge in a number of references to the “heroics” of George W. Bush and how much the military respects him that just comes across as forced and brings the integrity of the book down.
That being said, it gave me a lot of information for American Terrorist, more than I possibly could use. It’s funny how much research can go into something when I end up using only about 10% or it for the actual script. But all of it gives me a greater sense of understanding and authority to write an authentic scene.
However, when it came time for Andy to draw these scenes, I realized it was difficult to find photos of the NCTC. I searched for a while and what I ended up finding that worked out really well where a couple or arial shots of the building and road leading up to it.
This pictures gave us just enough visuals to come up with what it might look like when our agents drove up to the NCTC and showed their i.d. at the guard station.
Next, I wanted to include a establishing shot of the building to give the readers a sense of what the NCTC looked like.
Then of course we had the entrance to the building. This photo proved useful. All we had to do was add our characters walking towards the doors.
And I’m sure you recognize this page from the book by now, but here’s the photo I found to base it off of:
And that’s how we recreated the NCTC for American Terrorist. Look for more important scenes from upcoming segments of the story to take place here. I didn’t do all that research just to stop with these pages.
